


lover, i feel your sorrow pouring out of your skin

by artifice



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Cuddles, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Hair Brushing, Hugs, Kissing, Lots of kissing, Married Couple, Plot Twists, they're asian for no other reason than "i say so"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-18 06:28:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29729721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artifice/pseuds/artifice
Summary: “I’ve no right to ask you,” Enjolras closed her eyes. “But will you stay?”Enjolras comes home late again on their anniversary.
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20





	lover, i feel your sorrow pouring out of your skin

**Author's Note:**

> heed tags and take care of yourselves, please.
> 
> insp [this cover](https://youtu.be/yAg09E50XlI).

_Take from me whatever you want, whatever you need_ _—_

The click of a light switch roused Grantaire from where she dozed on the kitchen floor. She groaned softly and raised her right arm, blearily squinting at the smartwatch on her wrist. Eleven at night, nearly midnight. That tracked, with how dark it had become outside.

The overhead light finally flickered on. Grantaire let her arm fall on her face.

“R?”

The click of Enjolras’ heels stopped as she paused at the threshold of the kitchen. She quietly toed them off. Grantaire didn’t reply.

She registered few things in her weary state, only the brown-orange of brightness around her vision. Soft footsteps. The soft brush of fabric as Enjolras kneeled beside her, hovering over her. The prickling of awareness at her partner’s proximity.

She always had a sixth sense, when it came to Enjolras.

“I’m home— R?”

Grantaire felt a hand rest gently on her forearm. Still, she made no move to acknowledge the other woman’s presence.

“I’m home,” Enjolras repeated, rubbing lightly at Grantaire’s forearm. “Are you okay?”

Grudgingly, Grantaire shifted. Enjolras slid her hand up until she could pry Grantaire’s loose fist apart and intertwine their fingers. Slowly, she brought their linked hands closer to her, lifting Grantaire’s arm from her face.

Grantaire closed her eyes.

“Won’t you talk to me?” Enjolras tightened her grip and held their hands up to her lips, pressing light kisses to the back of scarred knuckles. “I know I’m home late again. I had to—”

“What day is it?” Grantaire interrupted. Her voice was low and gruff in her ears; weak, so _weak_. She kept her eyes closed.

Enjolras paused in her ministrations. Shifted her hold and pressed their hands against her bosom, where Grantaire could feel her pulse beating steadily beneath her fingers.

“Saturday. I’m sorry.”

Grantaire both heard and felt the reply.

“The date, my love,” she prompted, forcing herself not to dwell on the second part. After all this time, it was still odd to hear apologies fall from Enjolras’ lips.

Deafening quiet. The hum of the refrigerator. The quickening of Enjolras’ heartbeat. Then:

“Oh.”

“Oh,” Grantaire repeated softly. “It’s okay. I don’t know why I expected anything else.”

Enjolras said nothing.

“Is it really so wrong of me? To have hoped for better? For us to work?” She wished for the comforting crook of her elbow. It was too much to expose herself like this, stripped raw on the cold tiles of their kitchen floor with Enjolras’ hand in hers.

Eventually, the other woman spoke.

“Won’t you look at me?”

Pathetically, perhaps, Grantaire let out a brief huff of laughter. Weak. So weak. She could never deny Enjolras for long.

She finally looked.

Enjolras’ brown eyes were wide, her brow pinched with concern, and the corners of her delicate lips were pulled down in a slight frown. Her collar was rumpled, and the first two buttons of her button-down were undone, exposing her neck, the silver chain around it, and her wedding ring, nearly hidden in the shadows. Her dark hair tumbled from a previously tight bun and partially obscured her face. Impulsively, Grantaire reached up with her free hand to tuck the locks behind Enjolras’ ears.

Enjolras blinked.

Before Grantaire could let her other hand fall, Enjolras shifted closer and grasped it. Her back must have burned from the awkward position, but she gave no indication of pain, moving only to press Grantaire’s palm against her cheek and lean into the touch.

“Hello,” Enjolras whispered, turning her head slightly to kiss Grantaire’s palm. Grantaire promptly sat up, all too aware of the numbing pinpricks of sensation in her fingertips from having raised her arms. Enjolras rearranged herself to fit into Grantaire’s space.

Silently, they looked at each other. Then Grantaire leaned in for a kiss. She tried to remember what it was like, back then, what it was supposed to be like.

“Hi,” she whispered back when they broke apart. Anything louder would break their fragile reality. Enjolras kissed her again, languidly, as though her heartbeat wasn’t fluttering beneath the pads of Grantaire’s fingertips.

“I’m sorry,” Enjolras murmured. Her eyes were closed, black eyelashes a stark contrast against her skin.

Grantaire licked the apology off Enjolras’ lower lip and swallowed it, feeling it settle somewhere deep in her bones. Sighing, Enjolras released Grantaire’s right hand and fit their mouths closer together, bringing her free hand up to cradle Grantaire’s jaw and tilt her chin up. In turn, Grantaire turned her body and adjusted so that the other woman kneeled between her legs.

A drop of something wet slid down the fingers of her left hand. Grantaire leaned back slightly, opening her eyes.

Enjolras was crying.

“Oh, _chérie_ ,” Grantaire said helplessly. She wiped the errant tear away with her thumb, but Enjolras was beginning to struggle for air, her hand dropping from the back of Grantaire’s hand to clutch tightly at her wrist. “Enjolras—"

“I do this every time,” Enjolras despaired, finally opening her eyes. They were devastating. “We’ve been married for years, and I can count the number of times I’ve remembered our anniversary on one hand.”

“My love,” Grantaire shifted, cradling Enjolras’ face in both her hands. “My love. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have guilt-tripped you.”

She searched the other woman’s features for anger but only found remorse. It wasn’t right, Enjolras being like… this.

“I knew what I signed up for when we started dating,” she continued, leaning in to press a kiss to her wife’s cool forehead. “I’m a realist, remember?”

Enjolras had gotten control of her breathing, but stray tears still slid down her face, breaking form over Grantaire’s skin.

“Pessimist. But it’s not just that,” Enjolras added after a beat, “You’re right.”

“Enjolras—”

“I can't commit to the important things, not when it comes to you.” Enjolras snapped her head up, voice thick. “I don’t know why you stay.”

“ _Enjolras_.” Grantaire pulled her in for a hard, bruising kiss. “Enjolras,” she said again once she broke away, like a prayer. “This isn’t like you.”

A shaky breath.

“No, I suppose it isn’t,” Enjolras conceded. The admission was sad, resigned. Her tears had stopped, at least, but with how dry Grantaire’s hands were, it was as though she hadn’t cried at all. “I just haven’t seen you in a while.”

She wasn’t— wrong. They hadn’t so much as shared a meal in ages. Grantaire would start every morning with the ghost of lips against the nape of her neck, or maybe her shoulders. Enjolras was always gone by the time she’d wake fully. Grantaire supposedly kept regular hours as an art teacher at the local prep school, but she’d been staying after school longer than necessary—anything to avoid coming home to an empty apartment.

This was the first conversation they’d had in a while.

Grantaire moved to gather Enjolras into her arms until they were pressed flush against each other, legs tangling awkwardly on the tiled floor. Enjolras’ head came to rest on her shoulder, her arms wrapping around Grantaire’s waist.

When Enjolras spoke again, her voice was muffled by the fabric of Grantaire’s hoodie. “It’s like I can feel you slipping through my hands, and I can’t do anything about it.”

There was a lump in her throat too big to speak around, so Grantaire responded by hugging the other woman tighter, memorizing the feeling. With one hand, she undid Enjolras’ bun, deftly sliding the elastic around her own wrist and gently combing her fingers through Enjolras’ hair. They spent eternity like that, time unspooling from Grantaire’s fingertips.

“I still love you,” Enjolras said, lifting her head. “I do.”

Grantaire traversed the final few inches between them, gently peppering kisses down the line of Enjolras’ nose until she arched higher, capturing Grantaire’s lips with hers.

When they surfaced again, Enjolras tilted her head so that their foreheads touched, and Grantaire leaned against the familiar weight, savouring the moment.

“I’ve no right to ask you,” Enjolras closed her eyes. “But will you stay?”

Grantaire swallowed and closed her eyes as well. The lump was still there, but she forced herself to speak around it. Time was running out, having spent so much of it simply feeling the other woman folded around her.

“I’m tired of feeling so alone,” she replied, clinging to the fabric of Enjolras’ blazer with one hand and twining silky black hair around the fingers of her other. “I miss you so goddamn much, E.”

Enjolras’s breath hitched. “I’m right here.”

“Will _you_ stay? Please?”

Grantaire opened her eyes and loosened her grip on the other woman. Reluctantly, Enjolras leaned back and looked back at her. The certainty on her features was heartbreaking.

“Of course. I’d never leave if I could help it.”

“Then stay.”

Enjolras was already fading: her hair no longer wound itself around Grantaire’s fingers. The little world they’d created for themselves was crumbling at the edges, cabinetry and appliances turning to sand around them.

Grantaire woke up on her back, still on the kitchen floor with her fingers curled around the neck of a near-empty bottle of red. A poor substitute for Enjolras’ hand, but it’d been decades since she felt that.

It was Saturday. Probably mid-morning, with the way the sun cast a bright glow around the otherwise dull room. Grantaire held the drink up, observing the way the light reflected off the glass. Her warped reflection was older and betrayed her exhaustion.

“Happy anniversary, my love,” she said, then downed the rest of the bottle.

_— my lover, please stay with me._

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](https://rtifice.tumblr.com/).


End file.
